SUNDAY'S LATE GAME / Bruins Left Garden Early

Published 4:00 am, Tuesday, May 16, 1995

1995-05-16 04:00:00 PDT Boston -- The regular season ended, and the talk was, "Hey, we've got Cam this time and, hey, we've actually got a second line that can score, and so let's go, we're ready."

So what happened? Why is the hockey season over already? You know, que pasa?

"They checked and checked and held and held and made it miserable for us," declared Bruins coach Brian Sutter. "Their defense made it miserable for us, shift after shift after shift."

The Bruins spent huge gobs of ice time looking -- there really is no other way to put it -- helpless. They scored in just three of the 15- plus periods of play in this five- game series. They set a franchise record for futility by scoring five goals in a five-game series. They were shut out three times, and that is a franchise record for a series, and keep in mind that we're talking about a franchise that has been in business since 1924.

This was not one of those woulda-shoulda-coulda deals. This was ugly. This was borderline embarrassing. The Exit 16Ws took the Bruins out in five games, closing the door on meaningful Boston Garden athletic competition with Sunday night's 3-2 victory. There was a little flurry in the end, but it was all very Shakespearian; i.e., a lot of sound and fury, signifying nothing. This series was over a long time ago.

"We really got off to an awful start," said Adam Oates, who at least got the distinction of scoring the last goal in the history of the Boston Garden. "Game 1 put us behind the 8-ball and gave them a lot of confidence."

They played three games in the Garden, and the Devils won them all. What in the name of Milt Schmidt was that all about?

"The building made no difference," said Oates. "It wasn't a physical series, anyway."

In case you haven't noticed, playoff brawling has gone the way of the nickel Coke. This series wasn't about intimidation. It was about forechecking. It was about special teams. And it was about goaltending.

Martin Brodeur was positively Drydenesque at times, and he really got better as the series went along. He could have played the Game 1 shutout in a tuxedo. He could have played the Game 2 shutout in a white dinner jacket. But in both the Game 4 OT shutout and Sunday night's affair he was a very serious professional goaltender who clearly made a difference.

But let's get back to the forechecking and the special teams for a minute. In fact, put the two things together and you might have a better picture as to why the Devils will continue to play and the Bruins now will be cleaning out their lockers.

"Specialty teams hurt us badly," said Cam Neely. "Any one of us who were on the special teams has to feel bad, because we let down the other guys. We're the guys who have to do the damage on the power play. Special teams are supposed to be our strength. If we had played this way on our special teams during the regular season, we wouldn't even have been in the playoffs."

No. 8 wasn't through.

"One reason they did so well," continued Neely, "was that they did a much better job of coming up with loose pucks. We definitely did not get enough loose pucks."

"There were some tough situations New Jersey went into, and we didn't," said O'Connell. "For example, loose pucks. They went in and got them, and we didn't."

"I'm very disappointed with our forwards," fumed Sinden. "I really don't think they played hard enough, forechecked hard enough or got back enough. More than anyone else, they let the team down."

Sutter reunited Neely and Oates Sunday night, and it seemed to make a difference. Neely was much more visible offensively. It was the only game in the series in which you actually could forget that Claude Lemieux was on the ice.

But the fact remains that the most consistently active forward, the man who seemed to be involved in every play, was Guy Larose, aka The Hardest Working Man In The Hockey Biz. When a guy you're shuttling between Boston and Providence in the middle of the playoffs consistently gets everyone's attention and actually rates a second star, something is amiss atop the train station. Larose was signed on to be a bit player in this production. He was supposed to get a couple of lines, not top billing. It's nice that Larose played well enough to get a second star, but where does that leave the guys who pay more in taxes then Larose earns in salary?

So that's it. The Bruins are done, the Garden is semi-officially closed (why, oh why do we need this foolish exhibition game in September? Let the place rest in peace) and Harry is making out incendiary report cards. This story does not have a happy ending.